


Coffee Break

by Philomytha



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-05
Updated: 2014-01-05
Packaged: 2018-01-07 11:36:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1119365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Philomytha/pseuds/Philomytha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Criminals are stupid, Lesley always says, but sometimes they're also spectacularly unlucky.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Coffee Break

**Author's Note:**

  * For [weaselett](https://archiveofourown.org/users/weaselett/gifts).



The heating in the Jag was working for a change, even in the back seat where I was sitting as we drove back towards the Folly. We'd been interviewing another possible Little Crocodile in Waltham Forest. Since he was a historian who had written a book on Isaac Newton, we'd been really hopeful about finding something, and Nightingale had come along with Lesley and me to check him out. 

He knew about Newton, all right. Lots and lots and lots and lots about Newton. Nightingale had held up our side of the conversation pretty well for someone who thought empirical research was a childish way to waste time when you should be learning Latin grammar, but even he had started to struggle as our suspect droned on about Sir Isaac's family life and financial affairs. What our suspect didn't know anything about was Newton's third branch of study. Lesley had poked around on a trip to the toilet, and I'd scoped out the bookshelves while Nightingale talked, and when we were all finally bored into a coma we escaped to the Jag. 

It was a cold, damp and thoroughly miserable February afternoon, and Dr Montrose had only offered us a herbal tea that tasted like the vile love child of stewed grass clippings and liquorice. I had been looking forward to Molly's tea and biscuits when we got back to the Folly, but traffic was piling up on the main road due to an accident involving, as I discovered from the Airwave, someone driving through a junction while texting and colliding with a bus. There wasn't an official diversion in place yet, and the GPS on my phone was trying to take us through a road that had recently been made one-way in the wrong direction. 

"You could have joined Traffic, you know," Lesley said as I continued to mess with the Airwave and my GPS. We'd tossed for the keys to the Jag and Lesley had won, so I was sitting in the back trying to figure out the best way around the accident and listening to the reports. "Let's get petrol. Maybe when we're done this will all be sorted out."

She pulled the Jag into a seedy Q8 station and didn't move for a minute. She doesn't wear the mask to drive because the eyeholes limit her peripheral vision. Nightingale cleared his throat, and I gave up on the Airwave and got out to do the actual work of filling up the car. It was a pleasure with the Jag, even with the thick petroleum fumes hanging in the cold air, and the occasional honks from frustrated motorists in the tailback. 

By the time I was done, Lesley had her mask on and was out of the car.

"Going to the loo," she said. 

The petrol station advertised coffee, and I opened the door to ask Nightingale if he wanted anything, and he said he'd come in with me to pay for the fuel. 

I blame what happened next on the fact that I was showing Nightingale how the self-service coffee machine worked and we were just at the fiddly bit when it started to kick off. Even though he was engrossed with the machine, Nightingale noticed first, and then I noticed him noticing. There were three hoodies inside, and the way they were moving was a dead giveaway. If you're walking towards a cashier intending to rob her at knifepoint, you walk with a different stride and different set of your shoulders than if you're going to pay for your fuel or buy a Mars bar and a newspaper. And when I looked again I saw the knives, carried in the classic grip with the back of the blade against their wrists. They were serious and knew how to handle a knife. 

I looked back at the exit, and saw a fourth sitting in the driver's seat of a souped-up red Ford Mondeo with a mismatched side panel. I made a note of the index and looked back at Nightingale. He had this little smile at the corner of his mouth, like it was his birthday or something, and he nodded to me. 

I realised then that I had no idea whether I was allowed to use magic on regular criminals or not. I certainly hadn't had any safety training for it, and I wasn't at all sure where it stood on appropriate use of force and restraint. I tried to ask Nightingale, but it's a surprisingly hard concept to indicate without actually speaking and alerting our robbers to their imminent threat. So, lacking guidance from a superior officer, I decided to start with regular policing. I stood up and went forwards just as the hoodies reached the cashier. She was middle-aged, with her blonde hair scraped back in a Croydon facelift, and she had pegged them as trouble as well. I saw her take a half-step backwards, and she didn't look any reassured by me coming forwards.

"Hey," I said in my best police voice, "police." I flashed my warrant card. "What d'you think you're doing?"

Challenging three armed blaggers on your own is the sort of thing that doesn't pass any health and safety test known to man. I could almost hear the incident inquiry in my head as I spoke. They looked at each other and didn't stop, and I stepped cautiously backwards. The rule with knives is that you stay out of arm's reach. 

Unfortunately, some complete twat had put a display stand of newspapers right behind me, and I tripped over it backwards. Lesley was so going to kill me, if she ever stopped laughing. The nearest hoodie, a skinny white boy who didn't look like he could be more than sixteen, lunged at me suddenly and jabbed his knife in at my chest. I've got a bit more faith in my stab vest since it survived several bullets from a Sten gun, but I really didn't want to try it out again. 

At least I had the hoodies' full attention. It was very hard to look away from the knife, but I managed it for long enough to see Nightingale raise his hand. Nothing happened. Then the boy yelped like a kicked puppy, dropped the knife and leaped backwards shaking his hand and swearing. The other hoodies were doing the same. I straightened up and went to pick up the knives, but Nightingale shook his head at me. A moment later I realised that he'd somehow heated them, so I kicked them into a pile well away from their unlucky owners. 

The hoodies seemed curiously frozen, as if their feet were stuck to the floor. That, I realised, was because their feet really _were_ stuck to the floor. They were all swearing at us, but Nightingale twitched a finger and though I could see their mouths moving, I couldn't hear them any longer. He walked forward slowly, his cane tapping as he went. 

"I've seen worse," he said to me, judiciously. "But if you could make a small effort to pay attention to your surroundings, it would make your life much easier." 

"I wasn't sure what--what I was allowed to do," I said. 

"The smallest amount consonant with keeping the peace." He pulled a pair of handcuffs out of his jacket and snapped them around the nearest hoodie's wrists, and I did the same. We only had one pair of handcuffs each, so I had to dash back out to the Jag for another pair. There I discovered that Lesley hadn't been idle. The driver of the Ford Mondeo was sitting in the rear seat of his car, also cuffed and with Lesley looking smug. 

"I've already called it in," she said. "The traffic's going to hold them up a bit, but the local borough will be happy to take them off our hands. You okay in there?"

I didn't mention the guy who'd held a knife to my ribcage. "No problems. I haven't got your coffee, though." 

We never did get our coffees, because Nightingale's spells had done something terminal to the computer chips that controlled the self-service coffee machine. The lady at the till did make us all decent cups of tea while we waited for reinforcements to show up, so it wasn't a complete loss. And besides, there was still Molly's afternoon tea and biscuits to look forward to. 


End file.
